Article
Preliminary report: An
application of the
Good Behavior Game in
the developing nation
of Belize
School Psychology International
2014, Vol. 35(4) 421–428
! The Author(s) 2013
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DOI: 10.1177/0143034313498958
spi.sagepub.com
Julene D. Nolan
Minnesota State University, Mankato, Minnesota, USA
Kevin J. Filter
Minnesota State University, Mankato, Minnesota, USA
Daniel Houlihan
Minnesota State University, Mankato, Minnesota, USA
Abstract
Educating children on a global level is a dynamic process where policy, procedure and
guideline changes can leave teachers searching for new programs to resolve new challenges. This brief report shows a successful application of the Good Behavior Game in a
school in the country of Belize following a significant change in policy regarding acceptable practices in addressing school-based behavioral challenges.
Keywords
Belize, corporal punishment, diverse classroom, Good Behavior Game, intervention
As noted by Donaldson, Vollmer, Krous, Downs, and Berard (2011), the Good
Behavior Game (GBG) is an interdependent group contingency that has broad
applications across age groups and settings. The use of team concepts, simple
rules, and situation specific contingencies allows for easy introduction into most
educational settings. Having effective behavioral tools available for school personnel is vitally important for behavior management in diverse classrooms with challenging behaviors (Nolan, Houlihan, Wanzek, & Jenson, 2014). Although the
Corresponding author:
Daniel Houlihan, Department of Psychology, Box AH-23 Armstrong Hall, Minnesota State University,
Mankato, MN 56001, USA.
Email: [email protected]
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School Psychology International 35(4)
Good Behavior Game has a history of successful application in both US and
international schools, few studies have occurred in developing countries with
diverse classroom participants. Previous studies include a study conducted in one
second grade classroom in the El Gazera district of Sudan (Saigh & Umar, 1983)
and a longitudinal investigation of 45 children in first and second grade in
Santiago, Chile (Pérez, Rodrı́guez, de la Barra, & Fernández 2005). The present
study expands the literature on the GBG by applying it to culturally diverse classrooms within a developing country with few resources. This country banned corporal punishment in schools in 2010.
By adopting the Education and Training Act (Government of Belize, 2010a,
2010b), the Ministry of Education in Belize sought to end the practice of corporal
punishment in its schools. Rapid establishment of bans on corporal punishment
can leave teachers without alternative behavioral strategies to maintain classroom
discipline in a quandary as to how to mitigate common behavioral problems
(Dupper & Dingus, 2008; O’Neil, Killan, & Hough, 2009). While school psychologists are trained to provide teachers with data-based behavioral interventions, evidence of school psychology services is present in only 83 of 192 United Nations
member countries, (Jimerson, Skokut, Cardenas, Malone, & Stewart, 2008). Thus,
teachers in many countries likely have few resources to identify effective alternatives to corporal punishment. A change in guidelines that form a vital part of the
role of teaching without proper alternative resources can lead to unwanted confusion as to how to proceed (Low & Yuan, 2011).
This study was a preliminary trial of the GBG (Barrish, Saunders, & Wolf, 1969)
to remediate disruptive classroom behavior in a diverse population of students with
limited education resources, in the developing country of Belize. Three research
questions were posed. Can the GBG be implemented with treatment fidelity in
classrooms with few resources and diverse populations? Second, does the GBG
improve classroom behavior problems following the banning of corporal punishment? And third, do teachers and students rate the GBG as an acceptable classroom intervention?
Method
Participants and setting
Thirty-two elementary students aged 6- to 12-years-old from three regular classrooms participated. These included Beginners (i.e. kindergarten), Infant II (i.e.
second grade), and a combined Standard II and III classroom (i.e. fourth and fifth
grade). Participants represented a diverse mix of cultures including 19% Mestizo,
10% Kriol, 29% Spanish, 32% North American, and 10% Mayan, and reflected the
ethnic makeup of the school. The classrooms were approximately equally distributed
according to gender. Consent was obtained in accordance with University
Institutional Review Board policies and the guidelines of the Belize Ministry of
Education. Teachers were recruited through individual meetings in which the
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study was explained. Teacher participants had been trained in the United States.
Teaching experience ranged from 2–15 years. Two teachers held Bachelors degrees;
one held a Masters degree. Classroom resources were limited. No computers were
available to students or teachers, and teacher-made tests were hand generated.
Baseline and treatment conditions were conducted in the regular classrooms
(15 ft x 20 ft) during typical classroom activities on school days. Two classrooms
were set up with traditional rows of desks and chairs and the teacher’s desk and
blackboard located at the front of the room. In the Beginners’ class the students sat
at two tables. Data collection was limited to the class period indicated by the
teachers as having the most behavior problems and did not exceed 20 minutes in
a session. For classroom 1 and 3, all observations occurred during the mathematics
class. For classroom 2, all observations occurred during the language arts class.
Measurement
Target behaviors. Teachers in each classroom identified three behaviors to target for
intervention. Target behaviors included sitting improperly, talking out, and tattling. Sitting improperly was defined as any position other than being seated with
bottom making contact with the chair and facing forward while keeping both feet
on the ground. Talking out was defined as verbalization that was not preceded by a
raised hand or an indication from the teacher to talk. Tattling was defined as any
verbal message that indicated that another student was not following the rules.
Preference assessment. Prior to data collection, the researcher and teacher for each
classroom created a paired-choice preference assessment to determine studentpreferred reinforcers. The items on the assessment were based on a series of informal teacher, principal, and student interviews and were limited to those that were
free or cost effective. This assessment was individually administered to classroom
1 students (Beginners/Kindergarten) by asking them to indicate verbally, which of
the pair was preferred. For classrooms 2 and 3 (Infant II/first grade and Standard
II and III/fourth and fifth grade) the assessment was administered using a paper
and pencil format, with the researcher reading the choices aloud. Items nominated
by the students, as most preferred were used as daily reinforcers and included free
time, extra credit points, small candies, pencils, erasers, and stickers.
Observations. Trained school psychology doctoral candidates and masters level
school personnel conducted the observations during adaptation, baseline, intervention, and follow-up phases. Observers were trained using a video of typical problem
classroom behavior and were required to reach a 90% agreement criterion before
data collection began.
Data were collected using a 15-second partial interval recording system of one
student in the classroom at a time and rotating target students every interval. Each
student in the classroom was observed in turn resulting in multiple observations of
each child during the 20-minute observation period.
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School Psychology International 35(4)
Procedures
Intervention training with teachers
Teacher volunteers were trained in the rules of the GBG in one-on-one sessions in
which the rules were explicitly taught, modeled, and practiced with corrective feedback. The teachers were allowed to practice these skills with the researcher before
implementing the intervention in their classroom. Training sessions lasted approximately 20 minutes.
Experimental design. A combined single-subject experimental design (multiple baseline with reversal across classrooms) was used to investigate the effectiveness of the
intervention (Kazdin, 2011). This eight-week study began with an initial adaptation
period in which the observers were present in the classroom for three days prior to
beginning of data collection to allow students and teachers time to adapt to their
presence. During this time, observers were seated in the back of the room silently
practicing coding target behaviors, and avoiding engaging with the students.
Baseline. Adaptation was followed by baseline (A) condition in which trained
observers recorded the occurrence of target behaviors during regular classroom
activities. When target behaviors occurred during the baseline condition, classroom
teachers used common strategies such as ignoring, scolding, penalizing, and removing disruptive students from the room. This phase lasted three days for classroom
1, six days for classroom 2, and nine days for classroom 3. A five-day return to
baseline for classroom 1 and a three-day return to baseline for each of classrooms
2 and 3 was implemented.
GBG intervention. At the beginning of the targeted class period, teachers in all three
classrooms announced that the class would be playing the Good Behavior Game.
Teachers explained that students would have an opportunity to win prizes and
privileges during the class period by following the posted class rules each day of
the week. Teachers selected daily prizes based on the preference assessment and
students were told which prize they would be working toward each day. Teachers
gave examples of compliant and non-compliant behaviors for each of the three
rules, assigned students to teams each day, and wrote the team names on the board.
The composition of teams varied so that students more likely to be disruptive were
evenly distributed between teams. Students were instructed that anytime a team
member broke a rule, a mark would be written under their team’s name that would
count against their team. Teachers informed the students that the team with the
fewest marks at the end of the period would win the prize for that day.
Additionally, each classroom had a criterion for both teams to win. In classroom 1,
both teams gained access to the reinforcer as long as each had earned six or fewer
hash marks. In classroom 2, the criterion was set at five or fewer, and in classroom
3 both teams had to earn four or fewer marks in order to win the game and receive
the reinforcer. If both teams earned more than the criterion, neither team earned
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the prize for that day. This occurred on the first day for classroom 1 and two
consecutive days for classroom 2. During all other days of the intervention, all
teams received access to the reinforcer by meeting the criterion.
When teachers observed a student breaking the rules, a reminder such as
‘Alisa, please keep your backside on your chair’ was issued. The teacher then
drew a mark on the board under Alisa’s team name. Initial phase intervention
lasted five days for all three classrooms and the length of the return to intervention
phase varied among the classrooms in keeping with the multiple baseline design
aspect of the combined design. This resulted in 14 days of intervention for classroom 1, 13 days of intervention for classroom 2, and 10 days of intervention for
classroom 3.
Follow-up. Follow-up observations were conducted in the classrooms at two-week
and two-month intervals to track continued use and to determine if the intervention continued to be successful.
Results and discussion
The results of this intervention are presented in Figure 1. These results indicate that
the GBG was successful in reducing disruptive classroom behaviors from baseline
to intervention in all three classrooms. In classroom 1, behavior decreased from a
mean of 47% of intervals at baseline to a mean of 9% of intervals during intervention. Similar results were demonstrated in classroom 2 with a decrease in disruptive behavior from baseline (M ¼ 23%) to intervention (M ¼ 3%) and with
classroom 3 (M ¼ 42% at baseline & M ¼ 8% at intervention).
Observer agreement. Interobserver agreement (IOA) data were collected for 30% of
observations during baseline, intervention, and follow-up sessions. Percentage of
agreement was calculated on an interval-by-interval basis by dividing the number
of agreements by agreements plus disagreements and multiplying by 100%. Mean
IOA was 96% with a range of 88% to 100% and SD of 2.80 across all sampled
observations.
Fidelity of implementation. Treatment fidelity was assessed via direct observation
using a six-item fidelity checklist during 43% of sessions within each classroom.
Treatment fidelity ranged from 75% to 100% with a Mean of 89% and SD of 0.47
across classrooms.
Treatment acceptability. Students were administered the Children’s Intervention
Rating Profile (CIRP; Turco & Elliott, 1986) which is a six-item Likert scale measure of treatment acceptability based on Kazdin’s (1981) definition of acceptability.
This one-factor measure features internal consistency reliabilities ranging from
0.75–0.89 and is written at a fifth-grade reading level (Finn & Sladeczek, 2001).
The wording was changed slightly to reflect that it was used with a class-wide
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School Psychology International 35(4)
Figure 1. Percent of 15-second intervals with targeted behavior by classroom.
intervention and it was read aloud to the students in order to facilitate comprehension. A mean score of 5.21 of 6 (SD ¼ 1.49) indicated that students reported
medium to high treatment acceptability.
The IRP-15 (Martens, Witt, Elliott, & Darveaux, 1985) was administered to the
participating teachers. This 15-item, six-point Likert scale measures treatment
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Nolan et al.
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acceptability based on Kazdin’s (1981) definition of acceptability. This measure
was developed for assessing treatment acceptability of interventions in classrooms
and has reported internal consistency reliabilities ranging from 0.88–0.98 (Finn &
Sladeczek, 2001). The wording on this measure was changed slightly to reflect use
with a class-wide rather than individual student intervention. A Mean score of 4.96
of 6 (SD ¼ 0.84) was obtained on the CIRP, indicating that teachers reported high
treatment acceptability.
This study’s attempt to extend the utility of the GBG indicates success in reducing disruptive classroom behaviors in a culturally diverse classroom, good fidelity
of the intervention within a challenging setting, and good levels of treatment
acceptability among teachers and students involved in implementation. The results
of this study strongly encourage the adaptation of the GBG in other similar classroom settings.
Acknowledgement
The authors would like to acknowledge the help of Angela Christensen and Sara Ebsen in
gathering inter-rater reliability measures.
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Author biographies
Julene D. Nolan is a School Psychologist and Adjunct Faculty at Minnesota State
University in Mankato. Her interests are in behavioral applications of psychology
in international locations; she continues to volunteer her time promoting the development of school psychology services in Belize, Central America.
Kevin J. Filter is an Associate Professor and Internship and Practicum Coordinator
at Minnesota State University in Mankato. His research interests are in positive
behavioral interventions with supports, classroom applications of interventions
with noncontingent reinforcement, and applications of functional behavioral analysis within schools.
Daniel Houlihan is a Professor and Director of Doctoral Training in School
Psychology at Minnesota State University in Mankato. His research interests are
in the area of behavioral interventions with children.
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